Understand

I left the psychiatrist that day with the understanding that there were more people on my team than I knew. I went into a BRT and headed for home. As I sat in the bus, I reminisced over the days when I thought I was the worst thing that happened to my parents.

Before this new, strange phase, where my mother acted like I meant something to her, there was a phase in which she acted like I was a curse. I had no other explanation for it. The faces she made at me, the punishments she meted out, they all felt off.

I was too young to actually tell what was off or what was not off, but deep inside me, it was clear that my view of life was being crushed under the foot of the one woman who should have made me want to live more with every day that I woke up.

A slap may come upon the face of a child from time to time, especially when the child has intentionally disobeyed the instructions you had spelt out to that child numerous times. But what is the reason for communicating with the slipper the first time you notice something wrong?

A child will make mistakes; it is in the nature of a child not to know the right thing to do in every circumstance. There will be errors. But must there be a scar for every error? Why did we live in such a dystopian house? A home I almost never called home. I had a home that was more fitting to be known as hell.

When I gained admission into the university, a new phase opened up. Was it because my face was no longer before her at all times? Did she wish that she would see the victim of her anger at all times? In a way, her welcoming acts were scarier than her acts of brutality.

Coming back to reality, I heard a conversation of two young men who sat in front of me on the bus. I didn't know their names., but the subject of their conversation made me think they were scientists.

"did you know that the cockroach is one of the most disdained insects on the planet?"

"I would have gone for the house fly, but you make a valid point. I would have said it was one of the hardest to kill"

"yes, that's the thing. If humans were wiped out completely by some series of bombs and missiles, the cockroaches would still be alive"

"yeah, I think I heard something like that, like how cockroaches can live for months without a head"

It was at this point I began to realize what being the cockroach actually meant. I was looked down upon, but at the same time, I was practically the strongest survivor. I paid no more attention to the rest of their discussion as they went from talking about cockroaches to talking about the end of the world.

The bus arrived at my bus stop and as I stepped out of the bus, the floor below me became water. I sank right into the ground. I was falling for just about three seconds until I landed in a dark room. I didn't even think about whether this was a vision or not. Why? I was not the only one who came out of the vehicle, but I was the only one who sank into the ground.

In the room where I now was, everywhere was dark, except for the center of the room that was illuminated by the light of a single white bulb. I began to hear voices in the darkness, I strained my ears as I began to hear the sound of my father cursing and my mother shouting at me. These were memories that were far clearer than I could remember. It was as though heaven was replaying the recordings.

As the voices continued in the background, I began to hear footsteps. A man clothed in white walked out of the darkness and sat on a golden chair that was placed at the center of the room, the only place illuminated with light. In his hand was a huge bag.

He sat upon the chair and waited, as though he was expecting someone. As I continued to watch, I saw myself walk out of the darkness, tears in my eyes and pain in every step I took. The me that I saw, walked with great difficulty until he reached the front of the man in white. There, I fell to my knees.

When this version of myself was finally before the man, he fell on his knees. The man opened the bag and began to pour a massive amount of oil upon me. The oil flowed endlessly from a small jar. It continued to flow all over me until I was kneeling in a pool of oil.

The contents of the jar were not exhausted as the man closed the jar and kept it back in the bag. He then lifted me up with ease, as though the oil didn't make it difficult to hold me. Placing me upon my feet, he placed upon my head a crown he brought out of the bag. As at the time he brought it out, it was a dull bronze color, but the moment it came upon my head, it became bright gold.

One piece at a time, he began to suit me up in an armor of gold that was designed to look like a cockroach. When he was done, I looked at myself, and I sank once again. The version of me in front of the man in white looked at the version of me who just came out of the bus. The moment he did, I was back at the road side.

I got home and decided to relax. Later that evening, the entire family met to have night devotion, and when it was done, everyone went to bed. The moment I lay myself down to sleep, I heard a voice speak to me,

"the battle has begun, let no sleep come upon your eyes"

Confused, I opened my eyes, and I was on the battle field once again. I saw three portals of darkness appear at the far end of the field. Apparently, three sets of people had decided that that day would be my last day on the planet earth.

Red was the grandson of a warlock, and the spirits had said that Red would inherit his grandfather's powers, and his position as the priest of those spirits. So, somewhere in Ikorodu, red was clothed in a red wrapper and his body was covered in white chalk markings.

On an altar before Red, was a goat that had just been killed, and its blood flowed out, soaking the white cloth that covered the altar. The embarrassment of Red that took place sometime ago had gotten to the notice of grandpa, and grandpa would not take such an insult.

Grandpa thought this would be good experience for red, who had no real experience in killing. The most he had done at this point was to take phones and money. At this point, grandpa prepared him to take my life.

Knowing there was something supernatural about me, he decided to come prepared. Apart from the one goat sacrificed on the main altar, there were seven small altars upon which three one-day old calves had been sacrificed.

22 sacrifices had gone down just for me to be killed on this day. 21 calves and one goat. There were going to be eight different spirits coming to battle me on this day, and Red was not the only one who had me in mind. Ikulore's gang and Chief Olams had met and decided to seek the powers of the marine kingdom.

Ikulore's gang and Chief Olams were asked to get a pregnant woman, rape her, kill her, extract the embryo and bring both the corpse of the mother and the unborn child as sacrifices. They obeyed. However, there was a catch. They had to get me killed that night, or there would be consequences.

For Red, if the operation failed, he would die in my place. For Ikulore's two gang members and Chief Olams, if they didn't get me killed that night, each of them would lose a wife and a child, at least. These consequences were not even based on anything I did.

If I simply avoided their attacks and stayed alive till the day broke, they would all suffer the consequences, but I had more in mind than just dodging today. I wanted this to end as quickly as possible, so I called out,

"Eleazer!"

There was no response.

"Eleazer, the son of Dodo!"

A man came running from far behind me. I looked to know who it was. It was Goldie. Why was it not Eleazer? Where did Eleazer go at this point in time? Goldie arrived my presence, and without catching his breath, he gave me a little update.

"My Lord, Eleazer the son of Dodo has been called by the lord of my Lord to go on another mission, he will not be with us today"

Ah, what was my offence? No sword rains today? There was no time to mourn the absence of one of my favorite men.

"who is at my beck and call today" I asked,

"Adino the Eznite, Shammah the son of Agee, and Benaiah the son of Jehoiada"

Those were new names. I had no idea of what to expect from them, but it wasn't like I had a choice.

"call them to battle"

Goldie lifted up his voice and let out a great shout. The moment he began to shout, I could feel my body become light and nimble, it was as though he was energizing me. When he stopped, I saw the three of them begin to run towards us from the distance.

I still didn't know Goldie's realm name, but I decided to save it for last. The portals of darkness merged into one and that was my cue. I put on my helmet and drew out my sword. Out of the darkness came a being with three heads and six arms. Each head had three horns, and each arm was covered in armor and carried a huge club.

Slowly, but steadily, it began to take huge steps towards me. At this point, Adino had caught up and was standing with us as we watched the giant creature walk towards us, slowly. As it turned out, basically nothing gets done until I give the command, so I spoke,

"Adino, go and take care of him."

Adino bowed and ran in the direction of the three headed beast. In his hand was a spear, but as he ran, more spears began to appear all around him. I had no idea just how many spears there were, they just kept appearing out of thin air.

So Eleazer is a sword guy and Adino is a spear guy, I took note of that. By the time Adino got within swinging range of three heads, a huge swing set a huge gust of wind our way. As three heads slammed the ground with a club in one arm, Adino sprayed his arm with a perfume of spears.

These spears were silver, just like Adino's armor. From the tip of the blade, all the way to the end of the handle. As each spear drove itself into the arm of three heads, the arm stiffened. I could see even from a distance how the spears were trying to pull themselves out of three heads' arm, they just couldn't.

Adino was the same height as Goldie and the rest of the crew, but in front of three heads, he was like a little boy fighting a basketball player. Adino was fast. He jumped about quickly as he avoided the heavy blows that each swig of an arm brought.

I was almost carried away with the fight going on between Adino and three heads that I almost didn't notice another being come out of the darkness. Did I mention that Adino was no longer throwing spears? He now had all the un-thrown spears merge into one, and he was holding it as he fought, looking for where to stab.

Like I said, another being came out of the darkness. He was short, and looked very human. He was dressed in a dark cloak. He walked calmly as though he was just taking a walk through the park, but he looked at us and in that moment, he walked out of himself.

Are you familiar with cloning abilities? That was what we were looking at. With each step short man took, a clone of himself walked out from him. I was not going to wait to see if he had a limit on the amount of clones he could summon before I did something about it.

"Shammah the son of Agee!"

He didn't wait for an explanation; he ran towards short man. The short man army also began to run towards him. It was like a grow man running into a crowd of children. Oh, and here is one strange thing that happened. As the short man army began to run, I suddenly noticed that each short man had a dagger in hand, and Shammah had no weapon.

Shammah stopped a few feet from the short man army. I was about to tell him to get himself a weapon when I noticed something. Every short man that came within three feet of him suddenly fell dead. There was an entire army coming at him at this point, and so there was a pile of carcasses quickly building up.

He didn't wait for the pile to block out his view before he stretched out both his arms. The earth around him began to open up its mouth as the carcasses fell into it. The army of short men didn't stop running towards him. Each clone was able to make clones, and those clones were able to make even more clones, so there was a whole army on Shammah.

With his hands still stretched out, the earth offered up two long golden swords up into his arms. He didn't hold them and jump into the crowd of short men devils, he instead began to control them with his mind. Each of the two swords began to spin at incredible speeds and started to move into the army of short man devils, slicing and cutting as they went.

By this time, there were more short man devils, and some of them had left Shammah and had gone over to become a nuisance to Adino. At this point, Adino had managed to pull out the spears that were in the arm of the three headed giant. He had also severed off one of the six arms, but he had taken hits, and he was starting to bleed from his wounds.

The moment the short men devils started to approach Adino while he battled three heads, the many spears that had merged back into one, unmerged once again. They began to kill the short men devils as they approached, but this wasn't going to work for long. Adino was already getting worn out from his battle with three heads, controlling so many spears at the same time was not a good idea.

It was at this point that I realized I should have called for more men and I should have sent everyone out to fight.

"Benaiah the son of Jehoiada, go and help Adino."

As Benaiah the son of Jehoiada ran off, I looked to Goldie.

"can we call anymore warriors?"

"Ezekiel, Moses, and Elijah"

My eyes widened with excitement when I heard those names.

"call for them, now! And come with me into battle"

I was done watching the movie, I started to run into the battle field. Goldie was running beside me and he brought something to my attention.

"My Lord, I am David, I cannot call Ezekiel, Elijah and Moses into the battle, only my Lord can"

No wonder, he was able to summon men who were under him, but not those who were not. I let out a huge cry as I ran forward. I said nothing that made any sense to me, but I knew they had heard me, wherever they were. We ran to help Adino who was about to pass out.

Benaiah was already by his side, he made a huge pit that three heads fell into and he went into it to fight him there. Benaiah was more suited to fighting giants, he began to dispossess three heads of his clubs. Adino was barely conscious on the field when I and Goldie got to him.

The moment we reached him, he fell to his knees, and his spears fell. David immediately summoned a cave up from the ground. He called it the cave of Adullam. He summoned it over us and he lay Adino to rest upon a bed, a young boy appeared and began to tend to his wounds.

I stood at the entrance of the cave as an army of short men stood watching me. Why did they not attack? Did they know who I was? Were they afraid? As I was thinking, I saw the short men devils begin to climb upon themselves. To my horror, they began to merge into a giant.

The giant short man was no longer short. He lifted an arm to strike me when the heavens opened and a huge ball of fire fell upon the giant. The flames burnt them back into little short men and each one fell dead. I looked into the distance and I saw three men walking towards us.

One of them shouted.

"did anyone call for a man of God?"